A palm-sized brownish talisman intricately engraved with the three sacred icons of Melitele was clutched tightly.
At this moment—
A scorched black crack appeared across the girl's neck in the engraving. Within the fissure, faint golden light shimmered, as if divine blood truly flowed within the wooden talisman.
Allen's heart skipped a beat.
He had a foreboding sense that when the crack completely split through the necks of the three icons, the talisman would utterly fail.
"There's still time!"
He took a deep breath, gripped the sword's hilt with both hands, and continued thrusting straight ahead.
Squish—Squish—
The fleshy, blood-soaked textures beneath his feet writhed madly.
A cloudy yellow liquid oozed from the dense cilia, making the surface extremely slippery.
If it were Vesemir in this situation, forget about accurately stabbing those thumb-sized eyeballs—standing firm would have been an impossible feat.
But Allen, a level-six disciple of the Cat School's two-handed swordsmanship, seemed to walk on flat ground.
To say nothing else, the balance and muscle control honed since childhood on tightropes gave Cat School swordsmanship its remarkable precision. Thus, Allen crouched slightly, his hands swiftly piercing one strike after another.
The eyeballs, protected by bone and flesh, were targeted one by one.
[Monster Hunt] 15%
[Monster Hunt] 18%
[Monster Hunt] 21%
The steadily rising progress of the ritual made Allen completely focused.
The coating of enhanced necrophage oil on his blade had unknowingly worn off, replaced by a cloudy yellow, semi-transparent slime.
Its slick texture forced him to periodically use the Igni sign, burning the cloth wrapped around the sword hilt.
Gradually—
Rising steam enveloped the sword, obscuring the space between the witcher and the countless beastly eyes. Though the stench resembled burnt rotten eggs and churned the stomach, it slowed the subtle cracking sounds from the talisman.
"The steam blocks the attacks from the summoning ritual!"
A sudden realization struck him. Adjusting the angle of his thrusts, Allen no longer sought downward stabs alone. Similarly, his deft footwork across the red tendrils ceased avoiding the splattering flesh and slime.
The surrounding steam thickened as the Igni sign continued evaporating the liquid, once again reducing the ominous noises emanating from the talisman.
Splurt—
Another deep thrust drove into what appeared to be a large ghoul's eye.
A putrid liquid sprayed out.
[Monster Hunt] 27%
Allen prepared to retract his sword and stab again when suddenly—
The writhing flesh beneath his feet abruptly stopped moving.
Buzz!
The wolf medallion vibrated violently, pounding against the witcher's chest.
In an instant—
A sharp sense of impending doom gripped his throat, as if an intangible tendril coiled around him, brushing past his hair.
His instincts kicked in, triggering the blizzard potion coursing through his veins.
Time seemed to stretch, and everything around him slowed.
Without hesitation, Allen channeled his energy, swiftly crossing his hands to cast the Heliotrop sign.
A translucent, purple spherical barrier expanded from his feet and sealed above his head almost simultaneously.
At that exact moment—
Amid the white mist, a flash of red light dispersed the fog.
The overwhelming force twisted the air and smashed into the magical barrier, just as Allen's heart momentarily steadied from successfully casting the Heliotrop sign.
"How is it even stronger?!"
Boom!
The magical barrier shattered instantly, scattering into glimmering purple fragments that dissipated into the air.
Next came the three layers of Mirror Shield—
Finally, a golden glow from the Quen sign shimmered briefly across his leather armor.
Though the invisible force was mitigated layer by layer, the witcher was still hurled like a drifting leaf, his back slamming hard against a tendril thirty steps away.
Viscous liquid splattered everywhere.
Allen swallowed the metallic taste in his mouth, pushing past the dizziness and golden flashes clouding his vision to roll aside.
A moment later—
Boom!
The tendril behind him collapsed inward, its flesh rupturing and spraying blood.
Seeing this, Allen broke out in a cold sweat.
If that strike had landed, with the Heliotrop sign and Mirror Shield both shattered, he would have been gravely injured.
Wasting no time, he crouched low behind a waist-high tendril, quickly crossing his hands to channel energy and re-cast the Heliotrop sign.
"How did it suddenly become so much stronger?"
As the purple magical barrier enveloped him again, Allen peeked out, locking eyes with the massive single eye embedded in the high tower.
A flash of red light erupted.
Tangible, seething hatred twisted the air.
"Something's not right!"
Allen's expression shifted, and he dove to the side.
Boom!
The ground was instantly blasted into a massive crater, with blood and flesh flying into the air and raining down upon Allen. However, during his evasive maneuver, Allen caught something with the corner of his eye.
When the telekinetic-like, immensely powerful attack was unleashed, three of the eyes on the summoning ritual's flesh withered simultaneously.
"They're sacrificing the eyes to unleash powerful attacks..." Allen thought.
Immediately after—
Another three eyes withered in an instant.
Boom!
The giant vertical pupil flashed red, and an invisible attack descended from above.
There was no mistake!
Allen rolled to evade the strike, gritting his teeth in thought. As he moved, his sharp blue cat-like eyes noticed a few stones trembling and bouncing from the ground.
The earth was shaking.
Screech!
The furious cry of a royal griffin echoed, followed by an onrush of countless corpse-eating creatures pouring into the valley.
Roar!!!
The monsters' howls, mingled with Vesemir's furious shout, created a chilling cacophony that reverberated through the valley.
"No time left!"
Allen wiped the foul blood and chunks of flesh off his face. Twisting his wrist, he twirled his sword in a dazzling arc, flinging the grime from its blade.
If the swarm of corpse-eating creatures reached them, Vesemir would be in grave danger, and Allen himself wouldn't be able to approach the summoning ritual anymore.
"I'll have to bet it all!"
Glancing at the [Monster Hunt] progress, Allen clenched his teeth and crouched low beneath the tendrils. Stepping through the bloody mire, he dashed toward the tower.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The increasingly perilous attacks struck in front, behind, and to his sides, shattering flesh, blasting craters, scattering debris, and drenching him in bloody rain.
In the most dangerous moments, Allen's honed senses triggered his final Blizzard potion, allowing him to narrowly evade deadly strikes. Yet even so, his Heliotrop sign shattered again.
Fortunately—
Allen wasn't thrown too far by the attack. Within moments, dodging several blows, he closed the distance to the tower once more.
Here, the height of the tendrils could no longer obscure him from the enormous eye's downward attacks.
Three more eyeballs withered before his eyes.
Allen suddenly leaped forward, chanting a short spell as he mentally commanded the royal griffin to evade.
Immediately—
Bang!
A blinding light exploded above him.
Magic Flash!
For a brief moment, it was as if a noonday sun had erupted in the valley.
The incandescent flash illuminated even the clouds in the sky.
Boom!
An attack descended from above, grazing Allen and smashing into a tendril beside him, reducing it to pulp.
Roar!
The corpse-eating creatures roared in pain and fury.
Switching his sword to his left hand, Allen quickly retrieved White Honey, a Alghoul Decoction, and Blizzard from his reagent pouch.
Snapping off the bottle tops, he downed the potions, stepped forward, spun—
Stab!
[Monster Hunt] 27%
[Monster Hunt] 30%
[Monster Hunt] 33%
Roar!
The furious roars of the corpse-eating creatures echoed through the forest.
Allen realized the summoning ritual was in a fit of impotent rage.
The corpse-eating creatures, however, didn't freeze as they had during the first Magic Flash. This new behavior alerted him—the summoning ritual was adapting to the magic.
"Watch out, Allen! Some corpse-eating creatures are heading your way!" Vesemir shouted from behind.
"I'm fine!" Allen replied, taking advantage of his spinning motion to glance back.
The royal griffin flapped its wings, doing its best to blow away ghouls and rotfiends before tossing scurvers from the air into the horde below.
Vesemir capitalized on the griffin's winds to ignite explosive rotfiends, killing stray ghouls and alghouls while tripping up a few rotfiends.
But the number of corpse-eating creatures was simply overwhelming.
Even with the royal griffin and Vesemir working to block the valley's entrance, many ghouls, rotfiends, alghouls, and scurvers still surged toward the tower where Allen was.
Of course—
There was some good news.
Aside from the lingering effects of the Magic Flash slowing the creatures' movements, the sounds of human war cries and magical explosions led by Ianna's forces were growing closer.
Squish—
----------------------------------
[Monster Hunt] 42%
The corpse-eating creatures were still far away, but the Monster Hunt progress had already reached nearly half.
Thus, after pulling Elsa from the summoning ritual's body, Allen paid no attention to the approaching monsters behind him. Instead, he carefully shifted his steps, seeking the fastest route to pierce through thirty-four eyeballs.
Meanwhile—
With every stab of his sword, his peripheral vision closely monitored the movements of the colossal single eye to ensure he missed nothing.
It was fortunate that he did.
This was how Allen noticed the "big" move from the summoning ritual.
Squish! Squish!
The flesh beneath his feet wriggled and heaved violently, as if he were on the tumultuous waves of a stormy sea.
But this was merely bait and distraction from the summoning ritual to draw his attention.
Above him, one by one, large and small eyeballs of the corpse-eating creatures began to silently wither.
"What is it trying to do?" A chill ran down Allen's spine.
A single attack that withered only three eyeballs had instantly shattered three layers of Heliotrop sign mirror shields, with power even surpassing the Alzur's Thunder of magic source Vilgefortz.
Now—
Row after row, tens or even hundreds of eyeballs were withering...
What was it planning?
With this uncertainty in mind, the radiant blade of Elsa slowed down unintentionally, its elegant dance becoming hesitant.
There was no choice. If Allen wanted to maintain readiness to cast the Heliotrop sign and find a chance to escape while accumulating progress through continuous attacks, he couldn't go all out.
But he had only slowed down for two seconds before the summoning ritual seemed to realize its actions had been noticed.
Then—
Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle...
The eyeballs no longer merely withered but began exploding en masse, spewing out murky red viscous liquid.
In an instant—
An immense pressure descended upon the Witcher's shoulders, as though the dark, faintly blue sky was collapsing on him.
Rumble, rumble...
The ground beneath his feet trembled violently, as though the end of the world was upon him.
The intense vibrations, coupled with the slick secretion on the tendrils, forced Allen to leap off.
Splash!
Dark red boots hit the ground, splattering pools of dark red blood.
Before him, the sinewy muscles of the crimson tendrils tensed...
Allen's sharp blue cat-like eyes narrowed as he saw the immense creature filling the valley. What had seemed like mere lines of a grand ritual magic array were now tendrils—
Rising up!
"Melitele above!" The Witcher, now shrouded in shadow, couldn't help but gape.
Was this the second phase?
Roar!
The corpse-eating creatures in the valley howled into the sky.
Shaken from his shock, Allen narrowly dodged a lunging ghoul, only to realize that the towering body, as colossal as a city, wasn't even the final form of the "second phase."
Because the countless closed eyes on its body were still bursting in waves.
Within moments, only two-thirds of the eyes remained.
Over two hundred eyeballs had withered or exploded.
"This is bad!" Allen's face paled in shock.
If all the eyes burst into pulp, how could he accumulate [Monster Hunt] progress?
Even more dangerous was the enormous, grotesque single eye. Amid the hazy red mist, its eyelids trembled, flashes of red light glinting as if it was about to open.
Allen didn't know what would happen if that single eye opened now.
And he didn't want to know.
He really didn't!
"Allen!"
Vesemir's anxious voice cut through the cacophony of ground-shaking impacts and the monsters' roars.
"I'm fine!"
Allen shouted back, dodging the sweep of a massive tendril as he crouched.
While avoiding the attacks of the corpse-eating creatures, he swiftly thought about how to break the deadlock.
There were now four problems he needed to solve:
1. How to climb the slippery tendrils.
2. How to fight the summoning ritual for the eyeballs while on the wildly thrashing tendrils.
3. How to evade the next attack once the massive vertical eye opened.
4. And...
Dodging to the side, he barely avoided the claws of another ghoul that swiped past his neck with less than a finger's breadth to spare.
How to avoid the attacks of these increasingly numerous corpse-eating creatures without killing them...
"Wait!"
An idea suddenly struck him as he watched several ghouls dart past him.
"Why am I dodging these corpse-eating creatures?"
Was it to avoid the massive spatial distortions caused by the Conjunction of the Spheres, which would interfere with his attacks? Or to prevent the summoning of larger corpse-eating creatures from adding variables?
But his attacks were already being disrupted, and right now, the thing he needed most was variables.
If larger corpse-eating creatures were summoned, even if they only drew a sliver of attention from the summoning ritual, it would be worth it.
Perhaps—
The spatial ripples caused by the Conjunction of the Spheres might even have unexpected effects on the summoning ritual.
After all—
The ritual required a stable environment above all else.
[Hunting Task: Ghouls I (Ghouls killed: 92/100)]
[Hunting Task: Rotfiends I (Rotfiends killed: 33/50)]
[Hunting Task: Alghouls I (alghouls killed: 8/10)]
Slash!
A flash of silver light.
The Witcher, no longer dodging, held his sword with his left hand to guard himself while his right hand traced a sign before him.
Fiery flames instantly engulfed five rotfiends.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The explosions resounded sharply.
[Hunting Task: Ghouls I (Ghouls killed: 103/100)]
[Hunting Task: Rotfiends I (Rotfiends killed: 38/50)]
[Ding! Witcher Journal "Ghoul" unlocked. Conjunction of the Spheres: "Ghoul" will appear in 54 seconds. Please prepare accordingly!]
.....
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